


Game Night

by RunMarmiteRun



Category: Zombies Run!
Genre: F/M, Gen, Multi, Runner X - Freeform
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-05-07
Updated: 2019-05-08
Packaged: 2020-02-27 16:32:57
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 6
Words: 2,144
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18742825
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/RunMarmiteRun/pseuds/RunMarmiteRun
Summary: Gameplay can sometimes go too far.





	1. Chapter 1

“No.” I shook my head emphatically at Sam, Maxine, and Five. “Stop looking at me like that! No I said and no I meant!” I stood as strongly as I could in the doorway of the tent I had been sharing with 36. “Look, 36 and I do both have swords, this is true, but the thing is, we are both probably also the only Runners here who have a clue how to use them. We are not going to use them to LARP! These are real swords! They’ve been sharpened! Mine is from a military museum and it is some kind of Russian sabre, I had to do weeks of latrine duty and crazy unpleasant chores to get Janine to let me keep it, and 36 just now got these katana or whatever types from that takeaway shop. Been spending two weeks sharpening them. No means no.” I glared in my most menacing fashion at Sam.

“We’ll tell.” It was Maxine. “Your sword is earned, but 36 didn’t report the other two. How are you sure 36 knows how to use them? I’m not going to be patching people up just because there are random long blades floating all over camp.”

“But...we keep these sharp, Maxine...Dr. Myers...these are weapons, that’s the point, I keep mine locked up...Sam shush, I was not making a pun by saying that’s the point, look...”. I gave another look at all of them. Five was the only one who appeared to be even halfway listening, but that didn’t do much good since Five didn’t speak up. Literally. 

Just then, 36 came back from wherever it was 36 was always disappearing to. “Thank goodness! They want to borrow the swords for LARPing this week’s game!” 36 looked utterly confused, then I remembered that although 36 could tell you the backstory of every superhero in the comics and expound on how they were extensions of ancient mythology, normal nerd pursuits were lost on this one. “They want to play games with our real swords.”

“Oh. Well, why not?” I was astounded and about to have a fit of apoplectic fury. “Have you been paying any attention to how medical care works now? Our only doctor is part of the group wanting to play with swords. We don’t live in Star Trek.”

“Well, you’re her apprentice, you do swords.” I was fairly sure I was red and shaking by now. “That’s different.” I said it through clenched teeth. “I know how. I had training. Before.”

Sam cheerfully grinned in that haphazard way, his hoodie hopelessly slipping over; Maxine was standing primly, arms folded over and one eyebrow raised. “I...Fine...I am insisting on being weaponsmaster.”


	2. Chapter 2

We sat huddled in the coms shack, random scraps of paper and dice everywhere. Sam had a map spread out with a topography which looked somewhat familiar although I couldn’t quite place it, and lots of little figurines spread out. “Okay, X, pick a character sheet, we have some premade you can use. Maybe a bard or a druid?” Sam was waving some of the bits of papers at me. “Honestly Sam, it’s been a while, but I’ve played before, and I will not play a wimpy caster when I’m supposed to be keeping an eye on these swords. Don’t you have a barbarian or warrior or something?”

“Well...we have Alcathea, that’s a thief...Five already plays a barbarian, we don’t need two. Why doesn’t anyone ever want to play a bard?” Five rolled her eyes then winked at Maxine who was chuckling. “Well, we could always get Jack and Eugene...” started Maxine. “Right, that’s enough of that, let’s just get started.” Sam put a small screen in front of him then settled back. “So, our heroes were safely resting at an inn after their last adventure. In comes Alcathea, bearing two swords and a mysterious tablet.” I could see where this was going. As we played on, Sam led up to the usual quest through a monster infested mountain to seek an incredible treasure - and my thief, upon rolling to get said treasure, turned against my party. I looked at him. “Really?”

Sam looked back. “Don’t break character now! You have to battle Serena the healer and Shoggoth the barbarian!” I looked at the tiny coms shack. “Sam, I am not battling anyone, especially with live steel, in here. We’re going to have to go outside.”


	3. Chapter 3

As we walked outside to go “battle” in the cleared but still fallow land by the garden area, I was really, really trying to sort out how I got myself into these messes. 36 had the opposite sort of luck in some ways. Well, I mean, we were all in the middle of a zombie apocalypse, so it’s not exactly as though any of us were winning fabulous prizes, but still. 36 just let things happen - and the nonchalant way she had said everyone should just go ahead and play with swords! Honestly! I carried my Sabre, Maxine had one of the Asian style swords, looked like the shorter one, and Five had the longer one, I think it was called a tanto? I don’t know, I was trained for 15th century European longswords and later, not for any Asian weapons. My martial arts weren’t even exactly standard, being some strange self defense mix I’d taken, one of those fusion courses. But here we were, breaking curfew - another problem if Janine caught us - trooping out to pretend to fight each other in a half weeded garden.

Sam stood to the side. “Right. As I was saying - the cursed chalice caused Alcathea to forget her memories and become possessed by the ancient spirit. Serena and Shoggoth reluctantly spring forward, knowing they must defeat her and free the chalice from her grip lest the spirit take full possession.” I raised my sword and got in fighting stance. Maxine tried, but looked awkward. Five just stood there a moment, then looked toward the outer wall.


	4. Chapter 4

Maxine awkwardly hoisted the shorter blade at me and said loudly, “Alcathea! The spirit has taken possession of you! You are accursed! Let me heal you, I beg of thee!”

Five shifted to a fighting stance suddenly, but was still facing the fence. “Five, you’re facing the wrong way. Alcathea is the enemy here...” then he trailed off as Five started running toward the fence. A moment later, I saw it too and headed after her.

Although we’d tried to rebuild the fencing and walls as well as we could, there were still parts that were weaker than others. Just a few days ago, Five had gone to get some barbed wire from a rofflenet tower with me - I didn’t quite understand why Sam had kept singing the chicken dance and making terrible jokes about “egg-splosives” - to reinforce this area.

A small horde of about a dozen zoms was pushing up against a weak section of the fence - and it was beginning to give way. Five was running and I was right behind her. We could hear Maxine and Sam saying something but all I knew was they were about to get through - and Five had just some kind of unfamiliar weapon.  
Suddenly the fence gave and I was still a few steps away - but Five was in the middle of them. I had to swing on my left, watching my distance, but from the corner of my eye I could see Five standing in what looked almost like the martial arts stance I had been taught...


	5. Chapter 5

“Are you bitten? Get the shirt off, let me see your arms, both of you, get water across. Sam’s letting Janine know and getting the fence mended. Are there any bites? Five? Any bites?” Maxine was all business now, moving us toward the infirmary, pulling her bottle of water out and trying to use my tee-shirt to get the gore off and see if there were any bites. Five was calmly cleaning the tanto with her shirt, that sort of strange faraway look on her face again.

Five looked at Maxine, shook her head no, then calmly went on cleaning the sword. I was not so calm. My heart was still racing. I had cut to the left - being left handed was an advantage against humans but with zombies it didn’t matter much, you could only attack trying to slice across the clavicle and try to decapitate - this was looking desperate in my mind. I couldn’t understand why Sam wasn’t trying to go for help. He and Maxine were standing there, Sam was shouting and it was incomprehensible, he started looking terrified then slowly his face started looking more like he was at a football match when I caught glimpses of him. Maxine simply dropped the shorter sword and then as I brought down the fourth one I turned for the fifth. There was Five. Five brought the tanto cleanly across, decapitating it. Then she wheeled and we stood back to back for a moment.

Maxine came running over and what she was shouting started to make sense- she was asking if we were bitten. Sam was incomprehensible- mostly things about how that was “bloody fantastic” and “like something out of a Jet Li film only with more attractive characters.”

Back to now - focus. What had just happened? Five and I had apparently just taken down the zoms, but I only remembered taking down four - I looked as Maxine tried to inspect my arms and tried to start counting. There were the four - the fifth - and yes, it was just shy of a dozen, Five had apparently taken down another seven. Granted, some of them were very decomposed, but still...Five?


	6. Chapter 6

“So, Mr. Yao, Dr. Myers...I presume that there will be no more of these after curfew excursions for any reason?” Janine was being her usual self. Sam was looking a bit cowed, but Maxine was just staring. “Five and Elissa - I mean X - they killed eleven zoms between them that otherwise might have caught us sleeping.”

“That,” said Janine acerbically, “is the only reason there is not a punishment being assigned. Also, although the ministry materials warn against swords we may as a settlement re-examine this in light of the fact we apparently have some trained personnel who may be able to train others. I’d like to ask you, X, where did you get your training?”

I looked at my feet and mumbled, as I tend to do when Janine addresses me. “Well, in college I took some classes and I did and I did a lot of re-enactments over the years. Different time periods but a lot of European style mercenary swordsmanship, there was a fifteenth century German manual we used a lot.”

“Interesting. And you said you had martial arts training. Did that involve swords?” She looked at me, pen poised above her scrap of paper to make notes.

“No, it was a non-contact martial arts thing I took. Just like a mixture of styles.” I looked at my feet again. I had just been back home on holiday, taking a break from graduate school, when the world went grey. My hobbies weren’t supposed to become my resume and skill set.

“Now, Five - I presume some of your skills are from the military, but surely there was some extra training involved?” Janine looked over at Five for a moment, then realized it was Five she was talking to. “Oh, of course.” She handed the piece of paper and pencil over to Five. Five had a look on her face, a little inscrutable. Sam started saying something then. “Well, I mean, Five was just brilliant, she must be special forces or some such something, maybe Mullins sent her...”. Five waved her hand at him and abruptly scribbled something on the paper and handed it to Janine. She raised an eyebrow. Five raised an eyebrow back and gestured toward Sam. Janine cleared her throat slightly, then awkwardly read, “You know nothing, Sam Yao.” I suddenly realized why the map in the coms room had seemed familiar and inwardly groaned. I was fairly certain Janine was going to get one of two answers now to the origins of Five’s skill.

“Well, I would say that’s accurate.” Janine obviously hadn’t gotten the reference or was choosing to ignore it. Maxine was desperately attempting to control her face and Sam had his mouth literally half open. “Now, Five - your sword training?”

Five took back the paper, appeared to consider for a moment, then wrote carefully a few sentences. She looked at it, nodded, then passed it back. Janine took it and read aloud.

“The night is dark and full of terrors, so I drink and I know things. The most important part of sword fighting is to stick them with the pointy end; valar morghulis.”


End file.
